


Gloom

by Thimblerig



Series: The Lion and the Serpent [11]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Crime, Gen, day in the life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-06
Updated: 2016-07-06
Packaged: 2018-07-21 22:09:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7407028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thimblerig/pseuds/Thimblerig
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's cold and wet, and there's a handkerchief.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gloom

Wheels creaked. One hit a stone in the road and the entire cart jostled, splashing up a muddy puddle. Aramis tapped lightly with the whip and the dispirited grey horse in the traces heaved its shoulders and hauled them through the dragging mud. It sighed. Aramis tutted soothingly. Rain dripped from his hood onto the tip of his nose, cold and unwelcome. There was no one to tut for him. He reined in at a fork in the track and surveilled the options gloomily.

“Any time this decade,” Madame said from the cart bed, a waspish edge to her voice.

“Yes, Madame, of course, Madame,” he soothingly, then muttered, “What did the last minion die of, I wonder?”

“Stupidity,” she announced, then sneezed soggily into Aramis’ second-to-last handkerchief. He sighed.

He was uncomfortably aware that a nasty drag-out fight that ended with blood in their teeth and a dozen bodies behind them would set them both aright, balance their humours, and put cheer back in the day.

There were no bandits to be had.

"How is the contraband?" he asked. 

Madame flicked back a flap of burlap sacking. "Breathing."

"Fingers and toes still working?"

"Why do you care? Why do _I_  care?" She sneezed again. "At least this way he won't run again."

"... Professionalism...?"

Their prisoner, still buried under sacks of root vegetables, spoke up then, "This is an outrage, an _outrage,_ yea, though you press me under the stone I'll never talk, how dare you lay hands on me. I, Aemilio Buenrostro, am an agent of the  _Spanish Crown,_  and _-_ "

Aramis succumbed to one of his worse impulses, pulled down his hood, pulled his features into severe lines, and looked Buenrostro full in the face for the first time. In his purest Castilian Spanish he asked, "An agent for the Crown, you say? How very interesting, senor."

Buenrostro shut his mouth, teeth clicking. "When I say 'agent'," he hazarded, "I may have overstated. 'Free agent' rather, 'interested party' not even that interested..." Aramis held up a hand and turned back to the road as the trees began to thin out.

He dropped his Spanish persona and switched to earthy Italian when they came upon a checkpoint on the road and mounted troops swirled around them.  _ Farmer, _ he thought to himself sternly, as he introduced himself to the Spanish officer, taking vegetables to market with his sister,  _ and there was nothing interesting or good about the day. _ That last part wasn't hard.

“Root vegetables?” asked the Spanish officer, rain dripping into the grooves of his weathered cheeks.

“Indeed,” Aramis said sadly. “Root vegetables, consisting of radishes, rutabagas, salsify,  _ black _ salsify, something resembling skirret, a scattering of celeriac and... turnips.”

“Is that all?” asked the soldier, shrewd eyes sharpening.

“No,” said Aramis, sunk in gloom. “There is also a small bag of potatoes. The breed comes from the New World they say; I hear it's warm there.” In the bed of cart Madame hunched under her wrappings. Aramis knew her pistol was hidden powder-dry under the cloth, directed towards their interlocutor's heart. Their prisoner under the sacks remained uncharacteristically silent. Aramis tracked the sounds of the other soldiers behind him by the jingle of their horses’ tack. If this turned bad they would be outnumbered ten to two, all armed. It was terrible odds, and they'd likely lose their prisoner in the scuffle. Aramis waited, letting the moment stretch out.

The officer nodded. “Move along.”

“Would you like to buy a potato, signor?”

“I don't eat stock food. Move along.”

Aramis sighed, and tapped the grey horse into movement. When they were out of sight of the roadblock, he felt Madame tugging on his sleeve. Without looking, he passed her his last handkerchief.

He thought he was getting a cold.

**Author's Note:**

> "... a nasty drag-out fight that ended with blood in their teeth and a dozen bodies behind them would set them both aright..." - I could mutter something about how hanging out with a villain is making Aramis more bloodthirsty, but well, he's explicitly stated how much he enjoys fighting at least twice in canon, so...
> 
> "I, Aemilio Buenrostro, am an agent of the Spanish Crown..." - I looked up the meanings of Bonnaire's names - either 'noble good-bearing' or 'imitation of good-bearing'. The writers had a sense of humour! His Spanish Agent alias uses Buenrostro - 'good looks'. The things you do for a throwaway joke... (I'd plotted this guy turning up long before s3 turned up, by the by. Not changing it now.) 
> 
> Since my beta asked: Rutabagas are a cross between turnips and I think cabbages, they grow a fairly bulbous root and are sometimes called swedes or, to confuse things, turnips. Skirrets are a lot like parsnips. Salsify and black salsify are long and skinny roots that need to be peeled and ooze latex from the rind. I mostly picked those for the alliteration. Potatoes were introduced into Italy (where they're at) around 1600, and were a fairly well-established foodstuff by the time of this story, at least partly to feed stock. The things you learn for a throwaway joke…


End file.
